What my wife (not-at-all affectionally) refers to as The Money Pit:
Yep, it's an Olds...
I need to confess that have a sickness....I keep changing spring and damper combinations (long story follows).
It started with custom-built double-adjustable Koni Yellows with H&R Sport springs, which were then converted to coilovers with Eibach ERS 2.50" race springs (300#F, 200#R). They were horrendously stiff on the street and way overkill for a daily driver, but were glorious on the track.
Then I went to Intrax springs with KYB GR-2 struts, which I didn't care for. Then, I had another set of Koni Yellows fabbed up and paired them with Eibach Pro-Kit springs. For about the past 2 years, I was using a set of ACDelco RPO FE3 "Sport" struts which were a bit more forgiving for daily driver duty. The latest iteration (since I acquired a Civic for DD - gotta love 41MPG!) is a set of KYB AGX dampers with H&R Sport springs. Like I said - a sickness.
I've gone back-and-forth between various combinations of GM and aftermarket anti-roll bars more than I care to admit. Until recently, I was using a 24mm solid GM FE3-spec front bar, with a solid 22mm rear bar from Speedbuilt Competition Components. And now:
A 28mm solid Speedbuilt front bar is now installed, along with a set of aluminum front lower control arms, fortified with poly bushings. Strut tower bars from MRZ Performance up front (a very nice billet aluminum piece) and SLP in back are de rigueur. Rounding out the suspension mods, I have installed a set of Energy Suspension polyurethane end-link bushings for the front anti-roll bar, with custom-machined billet aluminum spacers. (WHEW!)
The brakes are Baer's Track+ system, using 13x1.1" 2-piece rotors, twin piston calipers (you'll find a very similar system on the last generation Mustang Cobra), with Hawk Ceramic pads in front and HPS pads out back. Just for the heck of it, it looks like Baer's new 6-piston (6P) calipers will fit behind my wheels, so we may see those when development is completed. :)
ATE TYP200 brake fluid flows through braided stainless steel lines to each aluminum caliper.
The mill....
The pushrod V6 displaces 3350cc and makes somewhere in the neighborhood of 220HP and 230lb-ft. There's the ubiqutous ceramic-coated fenderwell intake, using a S&B flower pot. The upper and lower intake manifolds have been ported and polished, as have the cylinder heads (they have also been decked .020" and treated to slightly stiffer GM LS1 valve springs). The ceramic-coated headers are from The Other Guys Performance Products, which dump into a Metal 'Cat metallic substrate catalytic converter and 2.5" mandrel-bent exhaust pipes from SLP, terminating in a Magnaflow muffler and polished stainless tips. Look closely, and you will see a 65mm billet TB from TCE Motorsports bolted to a ported intake plenum from the 60degreeV6 store. Rounding out the underhood mods is a set of TCE phenolic spacers to fit between the upper and lower intake manifolds - they keep the plenum cool to the touch even after extended running, and maybe give a smidge of horsepower and torque in the process (but who really knows). Hidden from view is an underdrive crank pulley from Fast Forward Performance, and a transmission that has been treated to a full rebuild with Raybestos Blue Plate Special clutches and fresh steels. To compensate for the slight loss in low-end torque that will come with the cam, I have swapped the drive/driven sprockets to attain a 3.42 overall drive ratio (stock is 3.05) and replaced the OEM plastic accumulator pistons with billet aluminum pieces from Superior Transmission. Of course this required tuning the PCM, so.......
Hidden inside the car is a slightly tweaked PCM from Digital Horsepower Inc. (custom tuning done by yours truly via a Digital Horsepower PowrTuner). A new drivers-side A-pillar pod with an Aeroforce Interceptor scan guage and an Innovate Motorsports wideband O2 guage (with remote-mounted controller) join Recaro Speed front seats to complete the interior mods.
UPDATE 2/4/2009 - the new motor has been built and will be installed shortly. LAM Engines in Kenosha, WI performed the machine work and balanced the rotating assembly. They re-bored the holes 1mm over, for new Sealed Power aluminum hyperutectic pistons (yielding a displacement of 3426cc). Wide Open Throttle Technologies supplied a mild cam (their 1280 grind - specs found at http://www.wot-tech.com). We have a larger set of fuel injectors, pirated from a Chevy Trailblazer 4.2L I-6. They were cleaned and flow-balanced to within 0.9% of each other by WitchHunter Performance. Wide Open Throttle also supplied a set of ported strip/street heads using SI stainless valves and Comp Cams valvetrain components, which have also been milled .020", cc-matched and flow-matched. New bearings came from Sealed Power and gaskets from Fel-Pro. The motor installation and tuning are being handled by MPRacing. We expect to see upwards of 275HP. Should be a hoot to drive.:) Some pictures of the new motor can be found on page 4.
Next is a shot of the current wheel/tire/brake setup - 17x7.5" custom-drilled Kosei K-1 Racing light alloy wheels wrapped in Goodyear Eagle F1 GS-D3 rubber. All brought to a halt by Baer Racing Track+ front brakes. Also note that in my quest to keep the car as a true street car (but still needing sticky rubber), the worn-to-the-wear-bars Eagle F1s are getting ditched for new Bridgestone Potenza RE-01R tires. I had considered Dunlop Zed One Star Specs, but the 'stones were such an incredible deal I couldn't pass 'em up.
Maybe an upgrade to these in the future?
Finally, a picture with the newly-added Razzi ground effects, taken at the Oldsmobile Homecoming June 2006.
One cosmetic exterior change is a set of Euro-spec headlamp modules that came from the factory sans the ugly amber reflector (just to be different).
Not one to leave well enough alone, they have been retrofitted with 4300K H7 HID lights for the low beams. Natch, the factory projector foglamps didn't escape the HID treatment either, receiving a 3000K 880 retrofit.
New for fall 2007! Recaro Speed seats for driver and front passenger.
The end.

Be sure to check out a few photographs from the racetrack on Page 2.
Thanks for looking.
Posted by: will8is9hot
05/05/2009, 08:11am
Incredible car. I sent you a PM. Please get back to me.